I am looking into some folklore in regards to human sacrifice. I was intrigued by an article I recently read, and wanted to look into it some more. I remember the film the Wicker Man, and hints in some novels in regards to sacrifice, about the Year King, or the Corn King, or whatever they were called. Does anyone else have any information? There was a wikipedia link in a John Barleycorn thread, but the link is dead, not going to be revived into beer.

Also, does any one know any songs (besides the possibility of John Barleycorn) that may be descended from those times?

I don't think that there is evidence of human sacrifice (as opposed to capital punishment or ritual murders) in the British Isles for a very long time. The suggestion that we burned people in Wicker Men seems to have been spread by the Roman spin doctor Posidonius, who we might regard as the Lynton Crosby of his day (except that Posidonius also did useful stuff like Mathematics).